


How and Why

by j_essyeap



Category: Killing Eve (TV 2018)
Genre: F/F, Post-Season/Series 02, Reunion, Villanelle doesn't actually talk much, eve pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-05
Updated: 2019-12-05
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:21:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21684427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/j_essyeap/pseuds/j_essyeap
Summary: A poisoned apple leads Eve to Villanelle once again
Relationships: Eve Polastri/Villanelle | Oksana Astankova
Comments: 8
Kudos: 46





	How and Why

**Author's Note:**

> Once more I'm here with a insomnia-driven one shot for you guys. It's unbeta'd and English is not my first language, so feel free to let me know if you find any mistakes

“How did you find me?” 

Eve sighed. That was a question she could answer. It was easier than its counterpart. She could answer the means by which she found herself in the hallway of this little chic chalet. She could answer how she got into a plain to Rome, and then a couple of trains and a bus to get here. She could say how she had, once more, harassed Kenny to get Villanelle’s address after she found that one lead on the news of one of the biggest Italian news website. She could answer that, and she would. The why though, was a bigger question, one Eve was not ready to answer even to herself, much less to Villanelle. The woman who just a few months ago, had put a bullet through her body. That… that she was not ready to answer. 

“I’ve been looking for you for a while.” Villanelle looked different, but just slightly. It wasn’t anything big, or obvious, she looked just the same, physically. Her eyes were different though, they did not shine. Her eyebrows didn’t pop up once she saw Eve, her eyes weren’t wider with excitement or interest. Eve didn’t think it possible, but her gaze was colder towards her. Villanelle was different. “At first, I didn’t mean to look for you. But people talk, not that I was listening. But it was you, and it was me, so obviously it got to me. Rumors you were dead. Killed by the twelve or locked away, tortured. Dead.” The words came out of her mouth, but Eve felt like she wasn’t talking. Like she was on autopilot. 

“How did you find me?” Villanelle asked again. Tunnel vision. She wasn’t receptive, Eve could tell, demanded an answer like it was her right to know. And it was, wasn’t it? 

“I couldn’t ignore it. I couldn’t just keep going not knowing if it was true. I had to know if you were gone.” It was true. Eve had tried to ignore the rumors, tried to keep living what was left of her life. She tried. But she couldn’t, it was like there was this rope that came out from her belly button and kept pushing her back. She ignored it until one day she could not move. She had to know. She had to be sure she was dead. That her presence was gone. That Villanelle wasn't wandering the same planet that Eve was anymore. She just had to be sure. “So, I remembered that after Russia, after everything, you still chose Paris. Out of every other country in the world, you still chose the one you both dreamed about.” Was it her voice that was talking? Eve felt like she was having an out-of-body experience. 

“So, I had a few places in mind. First, I thought maybe you would had chosen England. Because I was there. And somehow, I knew that you wouldn’t want to see me ever again. You never went back to Ana, until the moment you just had to. But maybe you would still choose to live there.” Her voice was so calm, she didn’t feel calm. She felt like throwing up, just a bit. But her voice… it was so calm; it didn’t sound like hers at all. 

That got her a speckle of a smile, just a tiny stain in her face “I wanted to, but I hate it too much. I couldn’t live there. You can’t be fashionable if you’re always wet. And even though umbrellas can rock some outfits, I like having both my hands available all the time.” Her face was blank, she didn’t let anything out through her expressions, but her voice trembled a little, her jaw was slightly clenched, her hands holding a firm grip. 

“It took me a while to convince myself you weren’t there. So, I started looking in other places. The USA was my second guess, maybe Alaska, but it hurt too much to think about it, and then Korea, but I wasn’t convinced you would choose to live in any of those two. Of course, I’m proud of my heritage, but it doesn’t make a big part of my life, being Korean. And I couldn’t imagine you living in a place like the USA. You’re too cynical about life to live in a place where people are so oblivious about everything.” 

“They don’t even have their own culinary.” The comment was filled with sardonic comedy. Eve could see Villanelle was relaxing her features, getting an even better hold of her emotions, after the first shock of finding Eve in her house out of nowhere. It made Eve relax, but just a fraction. There was nothing she could do to make all the tension she had been piling up her throat for these last couple of weeks to just vanish, but it was a start. 

“So, it came out with nothing, my research and at that point, I was starting to believe that you were gone. I was starting to relax. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that it wasn’t right. It couldn’t be, could it? You, dead, by the twelve. I knew you were better than that. That’s when I thought… maybe.” Then, her voice started to sound like hers again, she could feel her throat catching. She swallowed a big ball of nothing, trying to keep the emotions down, but her face felt numb, her eyes felt dry. Her finger aching for something to grab on. She grabbed her purse, to ground herself. “What if… what if that was the place. The place where everything snapped. The place where everything changed. Would you stay here?” Why would you stay here? that’s what Eve wanted to say. 

When she felt the plane land in Italy, she felt goosebumps all over her body. She thought she would never have the guts to come back to Italy after everything. But it suited, didn’t it? The place Villanelle had shot her. Here was the place she would start over. Here was the place she would build her freedom once again. 

Eve felt tears accumulating in her eyes. She took some time to gather herself, to think, to feel every emotion that was coming up in a rush. Why would you be here? “You didn’t mean for me to find you, did you? You were flying low. You didn’t know she was who she was, did you?” 

Villanelle was silent. It was like she wasn’t even there. Eve noticed the tremble in her mouth like she was about to say something, but she didn’t. “The step sister of the mayor of Milan. When I saw it, I just knew. Dead by poison.” Eve could barely speak; it was taking all of her will not to blink. She could also barely see Villanelle anymore, because her eyes were so full of tears, it was like a wall of water between them. “The weapon… an apple. She ate a poisoned apple. Source, unknown.” The word apple was punctuated by a sob, a dry one, for Eve was not blinking yet. 

Eve had actually had an anxiety attack when she found the news in the biggest news website in Milan. She just knew she had found her. Villanelle was alive. Alive and still thinking of Eve. Still killing her by other means. She cried loudly in her shitty apartment in a shitty part of London, hoping that her neighbors wouldn’t call the police when she trashed that god-forsaken apartment. She thought she would feel afraid, sad, terrified, anything other than just actual overwhelming relief. She was not ready to feel so much relief. She drunk two bottles of wine, she cried even louder, she yelled and laughed, she thought she was losing her mind. She felt alive once again. 

Eve couldn’t take it anymore, her eyes felt like they were on fire, she needed to blink. So, she blinked, and the expression she found on Villanelle’s face was nothing she had ever thought she would see in the other woman’s physiognomy. But there it was. Plain hurt. Red eyes, wet cheeks. “Why are you here, Eve?” She tried her best to keep her tone neutral, but there was a begging sound in her voice that Eve couldn’t ignore even if she wanted to. And she did want to. She tried with all her strength to not listen to the hurt in the assassin’s voice. But she couldn’t 

Just as much as she could finally answer Villanelle’s question this time. Why was Eve here? She didn’t mean to come. She just wanted to know if she was alive. She wasn’t looking for her so she could come to her and tell her whatever it was that Eve wanted to say. Eve didn’t know what she wanted to say. She didn’t think that much far ahead. When she found out about the mayors step-sister, she reckoned Villanelle didn’t know she was kind of a political figure in the city. She reckoned Villanelle had been going discreet about her killings and had the unfortune of stumbling on someone who would make the news. She had been careless in the kill. Maybe went out for a drink and felt the need to kill someone, maybe picked her up on a bar, or whatever. That’s why she knew exactly where to ask Kenny to look for Villanelle. Milan and surroundings. When Kenny texted her the address, she didn’t think she would immediately go for her notebook, book a flight for the next morning. It wasn’t her. She was on autopilot. Why was she here? 

“Why are you here?” Eve asked instead, because it was better than the black-hole silent in the house, and in her head. “Why would you choose to live here?” She asked more firmly this time. 

Villanelle shook her head. She wiped the tears of her face with fisted hands, swallowed hard once again. “You’re not in the place of asking questions. I’m trying to move on with my life. You came here. You searched for me, you broke into my house, Eve. Why are you here?” Why was she here? Eve looked deep into Villlanelle’s eyes. That kind of look where you keep going from one eye to the other, trying to access the mind of the other person like you could actually read it. Accessing her face, her posture, her demeanor. Trying to make sense of everything that was happening through the other person’s perspective. What is it? With both of them. Why is it that Eve can’t let go of this woman in front of her? Why was she willing to risk everything for her? Her life, her marriage, her job. Until that point, Eve just acted, not thinking at all. That’s what got her here in the first place. 

But now, there was nothing left. Villanelle was out of the espionage game. Eve didn’t have Niko or even Carolyn to blame for her actions. She was here because she wanted to. She was here because, even after everything – two jobs, a marriage, a stab and a gunshot – Villanelle still had this pull over her that made her keep acting recklessly throughout her life. And somehow, Eve knew, it had to stop. It simply had to. So, either Eve should stop ignoring her wanting, her desires, her thoughts and just… just let herself go, let herself drown in this situation as deep as she could, and hope that she would come out the other way knowing the least. Let herself understand why it was that Villanelle broke into her life, like she had and turned her world upside down. To finally get what it was that made Eve feel like she couldn’t get enough of her. She had been sipping little gulps of Villanelle for the last months. Somehow, Eve knew, she would have to unbottle all of the other woman, throw the cap away and drink it all up, large gulps, closed eyes. Let herself get drunk of the other woman. Inebriated by her. Or Eve could end it all here. Somehow. But Eve had tried, once before, to end it all, and the feeling it had brought her was not one Eve thought she could take. Because she hadn’t before. 

And for the first time Eve knew – or maybe she had always known –, there was only one option. She had tried to ignore it, but it didn’t stick. Her only option was to rush forward. 

And so, she did. She held her breath and rushed forward. Never once thinking about Villanelle’s reaction, because there was not space for second thoughts this time. She crashed their bodies together like their lives had a hundred years ago, and kissed her. Hard and messy. And there it was. The reason she found herself in Italy all along.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know what you think guys! And sorry for any mistakes, I don't have a computer anymore, so I had to ask a friend to lend me theirs for an afternoon so I could write this. So I didn't actually had time to ask someone to proof-read it for me, but let me know if you find any mistakes.


End file.
